The footwear market in mahabalipuram

The Footwear market in Mahabalipuram

The market of mahabalipuram seems to be very small but there is lot of competition in all types of markets. I will talk about the footwear market and how competition exists in this market. First I will talk about “SUN FOOT WEAR” located on 37 east raja street. The shop is in prime location (on the main road of the mahabalipuram market) and is less than 100 mts from the main square. It is adjacent to ‘hotel pallavan dynasty’ and opposite to ‘Hi! tours’ which are busy places during tourist season. This is one of the oldest foot wear shop in mahabalipuram (around 7 years old). 

The total area of the shop is approximately 300 sq feet and there is a sitting place for 3-4 customers at a time. A multi brand shop with all kinds of variety available, the price range is from Rs 100-900 (slippers) and Rs 400 -1500 (shoes). They maintain an average stock of 2500 pairs of footwear in the shop and the variety of foot wear ranges from casual wear to wedding collections and party wear. The majority of the customers are the local people but a large number of foreign tourists visit this shop to buy different varieties of footwear.

The common brands in this shop are Bata, Action, VKC, Paragon which contribute majorly to the sales and also some local brands like Fizik, Alive, Fusion, J&D, etc. The only challenge for this shop is availability of space; it is very small but has a good variety of stock. The shop has one sales woman and along with the owner, she caters to the needs of customers. The main competitors are shops like VKC, SK, Bata which are single brands shops and this one is a multi-brand shop at mahabalipuram. Even after the competition it has been able to generate revenues in excess of Rs 90,000.

While talking to the customer who came to buy sandals for party wear, I learned that the shop is the first choice of many people in mahabalipuram and has a good reputation in terms of quality and variety of foot wear available and also the price is competitive. The shop also gives discounts / warranties extended by the company and transfer it to the customer and also if there is a problem in the footwear they try to help the customer.

Kunal Kumar Gaddhyan

FT13433